Golden oldies: Tom Friedman at start of Iraq war telling Arabs to ‘suck on this’

I forget this, but Belen Fernandez, author of the new book on Thomas Friedman: Imperial Messenger, reminded me of it today. It’s a video she has made featuring Thomas Friedman on Charlie Rose at the beginning of the Iraq war, explaining the great moral/historical necessity of the war. Because the Arab world had formed the belief that terrorism could bring down the west, from our bond options to television, sayeth Tom, it was a noble thing to see “American boys and girls going from house to house” in Baghdad and Basra telling the Arab world to “suck on this.”

Wow, what a simplistic world view. I don’t think those people ever believed that. Maybe Al Qaeda did. This is pure collective punishment, and racism.

Here is Friedman talking to Avi Shavit about the causes of that war, at about the same time, and being far more thoughtful (Shavit is a wonderful interviewer). Notice the Israel link:

Actually, the Iraq war is a kind of Jenin on a huge scale. Because in Jenin, too, what happened was that the Israelis told the Palestinians, We left you here alone and you played with matches until suddenly you blew up a Passover seder in Netanya. And therefore we are not going to leave you along any longer. We will go from house to house in the Casbah. And from America’s point of view, Saddam’s Iraq is Jenin. This war is a defensive shield. It follows that the danger is the same: that like Israel, America will make the mistake of using only force…

Is the Iraq war the great neoconservative war? It’s the war the neoconservatives wanted, Friedman says. It’s the war the neoconservatives marketed. Those people had an idea to sell when September 11 came, and they sold it. Oh boy, did they sell it. So this is not a war that the masses demanded. This is a war of an elite. Friedman laughs: I could give you the names of 25 people (all of whom are at this moment within a five-block radius of this office) who, if you had exiled them to a desert island a year and a half ago, the Iraq war would not have happened.

37 Responses

Well at least we have some honesty here. The United States is adopting Israeli military policy and tactics vis-a-vis attacking Arab civilians, and the people who supported the war make no bones about the fact that Israel was their guiding light in taking the US to war with Iraq.

It looks like sometimes they do tell us the Truth.
“Friedman laughs:
I could give you the names of 25 PEOPLE (all of whom are at this moment within a five-block radius of this office) who, if you had exiled them to a desert island a year and a half ago, the Iraq war WOULD NOT HAVE happened.”
“An nescis, mi fili, quantilla sapientia mundus regatur?”, (Don’t you know, my son, how little wisdom is needed to rule the world?”.
Yes, if it takes 25 people to start the war by so called “democratic” country.

Woolsey, Micheal Rubin, Kagans, Wurmsers, Bolton, “mushroom cloud” Rice, Judy “I was fucking right” Miller,Rumsfeld, Micheal Ledeen. The devil is building a new wing in hell for this psychopathic group

RE: “We will go from house to house in the Casbah.” ~ “Tommy Boy” Friedman

MY COMMENT: Well isn’t that just too cute! It says a lot about Tom Friedman. I didn’t realize what an immature über-ass he was.The Clash of Civilizations?The Clash: Rock The Casbah (VIDEO, 03:43) – link to youtube.comRock the Casbah in HEBRON REMIX 2010!!! *NEW* (VIDEO, 01:51) – link to youtube.com

(excerpt)…An essential motive of Zionism from its beginning was a fierce desire to end the centuries of Jewish weakness, to show the world that Jews would no longer be pushed around, that they’d fight back and prove themselves tougher than their enemies. There was more to Zionism than that. But the “pride through strength” piece came to dominate the whole project. Hence the massive Israeli military machine with its nuclear arsenal.But you can’t prove that you’re stronger than your enemies unless you’ve also got enemies — or at least believe you’ve got enemies — to fight against. So there has to be a myth of Israel’s insecurity, fueled by an image of vicious anti-semites lurking somewhere out there, for Zionism to work. Since the 1979 Iranian revolution, Iran has gradually risen to the top of Israel oh-so-necessary enemies list. Iranophobia is rampant in Israel, as one Israeli scholar writes, because “Israel needs an existential threat.”Anyone who has grown up in Israel, or in the U.S. Jewish community (as I did), and paid attention knows all this…

P.P.S. REGARDING TOM FRIEDMAN AND HIS ÜBER-MACHO “SUCK ON THIS”, ALSO SEE: How the Power of Myth Keeps Us Mired in War, By Ira Chernus, TomDispatch.com, 01/20/11

(excerpt)”…White Americans, going back to early colonial
times, generally assigned the role of ‘bad guys’ to ‘savages’ lurking in the wilderness beyond the borders of our civilized land. Whether they were redskins, commies, terrorists, or the Taliban, the plot has always remained the same.
Call it the myth of national security — or, more accurately, national insecurity, since it always tells us who and what to fear.
It’s been a mighty (and mighty effective) myth…”

P.P.P.P.S. RE: “So there has to be a myth of Israel’s insecurity, fueled by an image of vicious anti-semites lurking somewhere out there, for Zionism to work.” ~ Chernus
ALSO SEE THIS DOCUMENTARY: Defamation (2009), by Yoav Shamir, 91 minutes“Defamation” can be streamed from Netflix –link to movies.netflix.com“Defamation” on YouTube (in 9 parts) –link to youtube.com

P.P.P.P.P.S. RE: “So there has to be a myth of Israel’s insecurity, fueled by an image of vicious anti-semites lurking somewhere out there, for Zionism to work.” ~ Chernus

ALSO SEE: Avraham Burg: Israel’s new prophet ~ By Donald Macintyre, The Independent, 1 November 2008
Avraham Burg was a pillar of the Israeli establishment but his new book is causing a sensation. It argues that Israel is an “abused child” which has become a “violent parent”. And his solutions are radical, as he explains to Donald Macintyre.
LINK – link to independent.co.uk

There’s a “rule of da hood” component in the neocon worldview. Schoolyard ethics. They are bullies so it is not surprising. Nationalism of their sort is also very infantile. At one point in early life, you’re supposed to grow up, see the bigger picture and stop following a possibly natural instinct toward tribalism. Or you don’t and become vindictive adults like Rachel Abrams or Jennifer Rubin or Tom Friedman (using neocons to make my point here but I don’t see bullies only in this corner).

I’m surprised that Phil could have forgotten this very juicy little nugget of Friedman. True Friedman “connoisseurs” know it’s one of his best quote!

BTW .
What a chutzpa ( unfortunately probably true) it takes to admit blatantly, publically and openly, that it took 25 people to start the war with Iraq.
What a slap in the cheek given to all “political powers” in the USA.!!!!
It is like saying: “you all ,dumb/numb, American idiots, you think you live in democracy. So……………………………..dream on. ”
He ,(Friedman) must have a big ,iron back supporting him to say something like this ,publically.

I guess , I’m the only one here, that is bothered by the fact that 0.0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000025%
of the country’s population decided, that the country is going to be engaged in the war.
What is the definition of totalitarian country??

good point. All of this “move on, turn the page, next chapter, don’t be about vengeance, witch hunts, retribution” Can you imagine someone saying this to Jewish families or anyone else who lost family members in the Holocaust?

Will the Iraqi people produce a Simon Weisenthal who hunted down Nazi’s for decades? Will they hunt down those who lied this nation into Iraq and those responsible for all of the death and destruction?

“I’ve talked to quite a few of these “boys” who kicked down some of these doors in Baghdad. Most of them feel ashamed about what they did.”

Kicking down doors and doing house-to-house searches at times using human shields in Iraq was actually taught to American servicemen by Israelis that had mastered the art; the training included the vile practice of targeted assasinations.

From MSNBC in 2003:

“… The British newspaper The Guardian recently reported Israeli advisers are training U.S. soldiers at Fort Bragg, N.C.

Lt. Col. Hans Bush, of the U.S. Army’s Special Operations Command, said there are no Israeli forces “currently teaching Army Special Operations Command forces at Fort Bragg.”

Last week, a large delegation from the Army Training and Doctrine Command in Fort Monroe, Va., visited Israel. Harvey Perritt, the command’s civilian spokesman, said the meeting was routine, but would not elaborate.

The Israeli army said in a statement it does not comment on “ongoing strategic cooperation between the U.S. and the Israeli military.”

But military officials close to the sides, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the meetings focused on lessons learned from Israel’s fighting in the West Bank and Gaza and how to adapt them to Iraq.”

“… Israeli expert predicts U.S. defeat
Martin Van Creveld, an Israeli military expert, warned that just as Israel has been unsuccessful in eliminating militant groups and suicide bombers, the United States cannot expect to be victorious in Iraq.

Van Creveld traveled to Camp Lejeune, N.C., last year to lecture U.S. military officials on the door-to-door fighting that took place in April 2002 in the West Bank refugee camp of Jenin. Twenty-three Israeli soldiers and 52 Palestinians were killed in the battle.

“They are already doing things that we have been doing for years to no avail, like demolishing buildings … like closing off villages in barbed wire,” Van Creveld said. “The Americans are coming here to try to mimic all kinds of techniques, but it’s not going to do them any good.”

In Iraq, the Americans have a more difficult task than Israel’s in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, Van Creveld said. Iraq is larger, the borders are open and there is almost unlimited access to arms.

“I don’t see how on earth they (the U.S.) can win. I think this is going to end the same way Vietnam did,” Van Creveld said. “They are going to flee the country hanging on the strings of helicopters,” he added, referring to the 1973 U.S. departure from Saigon.”

“suck on this” Friedman is covered in the Iraqi people’s blood along with American “boys and girls” blood. I clearly remember him all over the place before the invasion along with Bolton, Gaffney, Pollack, Woolsey, Kristol, Frum, the Cheney/ Bush war thugs pushing pushing the lies.

Do you think Friedman encourages his children to serve in the US military? Fuck no. The man is a very rich yellow bellied chicken hawk.

“The smart money says the U.S. economy will splinter, with some states thriving, some states not, and all eyes are on California as the nightmare scenario. After a hair-raising visit with former governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, who explains why the Golden State has cratered, Michael Lewis goes where the buck literally stops—the local level, where the likes of San Jose mayor Chuck Reed and Vallejo ﬁre chief Paige Meyer are trying to avert even worse catastrophes and rethink what it means to be a society.”

“Actually, the Iraq war is a kind of Jenin on a huge scale. Because in Jenin, too, what happened was that the Israelis told the Palestinians, We left you here alone and you played with matches until suddenly you blew up a Passover seder in Netanya. And therefore we are not going to leave you along any longer. We will go from house to house in the Casbah. And from America’s point of view, Saddam’s Iraq is Jenin.”

That’s no better than “Suck on this”. The Israelis didn’t leave the Palestinians alone. Friedman knows that. The Palestinians live under occupation and in the Second Intifada it was the Israelis who were killing civilians in large numbers before the Palestinians used suicide bombing. Palestinian civilian deaths were far higher than Israeli deaths.

And in Iraq, the sanctions are of no importance to this jerk. Imagine the extreme hysterical reaction that would ensue if somehow Israel or (why not go crazy with the fantasy) the US were subjected to the sort of sanctions regime we inflicted on Iraq.

Friedman is a person with no moral compass. American liberals, some of them well-intentioned, often don’t understand this. They might agree if one said this about Bush or Cheney, but they can’t or won’t see just how horrible some of our so-called liberal pundits and politicians really are. I suppose it hits too close to home.

Mondoweiss in Your Inbox

There are now two ways to get Mondoweiss delivered directly to your inbox! Sign up for a daily digest of every story we publish or a weekly collection of highlights picked by Mondoweiss staff to stay up to date with our independent coverage of events in Israel/Palestine.

Subscription Options:

Weekly Daily Both

Support Mondoweiss’s independent journalism today

Mondoweiss brings you the news that no one else will. Your tax-deductible donation enables us to deliver information, analysis and voices stifled elsewhere. Please give now to maintain and grow this unique resource.